Thursday, January 11, 2007

Our new blog

Postscript

When we tell people here in DC that we just came from New Orleans their reactions would be the same if we told them we came from downtown Baghdad. Also, two people that Aubie works with in other offices called her today worried about our safety! They didn't know that we moved and were very relieved to hear that we did. It's very odd.

I'm watching a special on CNN about New Orleans. That's not the New Orleans I know. Our area in the Warehouse district was quite safe and any damage we saw was minimal. We saw quiet streets, jacked up Entergy bills and businesses that closed down early. That's about it.

We left before the new year so we haven't been around during the recent crime wave. I don't have a clue what's going on down there on the ground now. We wish everyone there the best.

We intend to start blogging about DC in the near future. I'll put up the link when we start it.

Sunday, October 29, 2006

The Saints are Coming

Friday, October 13, 2006

My Birthday at NOLA

Bama and I went to Emeril's NOLA restaurant tonight to celebrate my birthday. It was an adventure getting there since we don't normally drive when we go to the FQ. We decided to drive since NOLA's validates your parking at the OMNI and I did not want to do the 30-minute walk in the dark.

Dinner was great! The service was fantastic. I started off with the bisque, while Bama had the arugula salad. We were twinkies on the entree and both ordered the filet with garlic mashed potatoes, & a blue cheese stuffed mushroom. For dessert, I had the NOLA Buzz Bomb and Bama had the peanut butter pie. He said it was the best dessert EVER.

It was pricey but it was my birthday & I felt like I deserved it. We really loved it but Bama say's we can't go back unless we win the lottery. I've always told him that I have expensive taste.

Friday, October 06, 2006

Elmwood Fitness Center - 3 months in

We recently got a huge spike in hits and I found that we were linked on the new orleans live journal page. People have questions about joining gyms and our post with our gym review drew them here.

The gym review post has also driven a lot of traffic to this blog in the past so I figured I'd post an update.

First things first. In my original post I said it was located in One Shell. It's located in the concourse which is the smaller building beside One Shell.

Now some updates. The staff is awesome. In my first post I thought they seemed a little standoffish (is that a word?) but they aren't. Everyone is super nice. We feel really comfortable around them.

As far as the cardio room - we still love it. There are tons of machines and I've never been there at a time when there wasn't a machine available. There are some times when the ellipticals are all taken - but that is really rare. In fact, every time we wanted to use the elliptical there have always been two to spare. Treadmills are never taken. Not once have I seen them all in use. The same goes for the bikes and stair steppers. I don't think those are that popular at all. I've been at all times of the day and never seen more than two people on those things.

The weight room is more popular.

My only complaint is that there is only one squat rack. There is a smith machine beside it but now that I've been lifting for 3 months I'm officially a gym snob. I look at it in disgust. There aren't a lot of guys doing squats in the squat rack. They like to do shrugs and other stuff on it. I think I've seen about 5 guys doing actual squats in my entire time there. I really don't think they can justify adding another rack but it is the only piece of equipment that I have to wait to use sometimes.

The rest is usually open. There are always plenty of benches and dumbbells. There are two lat pull down machines so there's usually one open. The rest is pretty sparsely used. There are only a couple of Swiss balls but I've never had a problem getting one.

The music is really hit or miss. Sometimes they have some good motivational stuff. Most times-not so much though. I heard "hanging tough" by the new kids on the block one time so you can judge what kind of place it is by that alone I guess. My advice -bring an Ipod

The crowd is definitely not intimidating. There aren't that many stereotypical bodybuilders. There's always going be a couple of really strong guys but not that many. The ones I ran into are always really cool. There's a good mix of women, older people, thin people and fat people. We both feel really comfortable working out there.

So, to make a short story long, that's the update. If you have any questions about the place feel free to email me.

Be a Saint

Sunday, September 24, 2006

The Saints are kind of a big deal

We were walking to the gym after that Meet the Saints deal the other day and let's just say people got excited. People leaned out of their cars and yelled "UNDEFEATED" at us. It was hilarious.

It seems like the city will be shutting down tomorrow for the big game. A lot of businesses will be closing early (at the request of the mayor) in order to accommodate the traffic problems. My office is one of those closing down early.

Monday, September 18, 2006

Meet the Saints

There was some thing going on at Lafayette Square today called "Meet the Saints." I didn't bring my camera because I suck. They had some band on a stage talking about how you have to cheer for the Saints on Monday. Lots of "12th man" kind of stuff.

The only Saint I saw was the Beerman. I think they started at 5 so I'm sure I missed a few.

Sunday, August 20, 2006

Juan's Flying Burrito

The atmosphere of the place was unique - for us anyway. They play really loud music and seem to cater to "alternative" types of people. I felt out of place since I don't have wild hair, tatoos and/or body piercings. I never thought of us as "conservative" types but when you get down to it I guess we really are. Nevertheless, we always seem to wander into the "hip" joints.

We are getting too old.

Mexican food is yet another of the many types of food that Aubie loves and I fear and try to avoid. Remember the sushi joint Rock-n-sake that I talked about earlier? (BTW - You wouldn't believe how many hits we get from google searches for that place).

I'm broadening my culinary horizons here in NOLA though so we went.

We had some chips for an entree. The dip was some sort of salsa/bean/sour cream/jalapeno/rice/cheese combo. It was really good.

I then had the "famous" flying burrito. It was pretty good as far as burritos go. The thing was HUGE. I saw people pick theirs up and eat it with their hands but I am apparently too uncoordinated for that. It comes in a little french fry basket covered with a little wax paper. I managed to destroy the paper with my fork and spent a lot of time trying not to leave my food on the table.

Aubie made me present her gripes so she won't have to bother to post. They are as follows.

1) You have to pay for chips and salsa.

Every other Mexican restaurant we've ever been to has offered them for free.

2) The salsa was chunky

Aubie is a fan of watered down salsa. Chunky salsa makes Aubie angry!

Alas, I have no picture of the Miller Lite I drank. You'll have to trust me when I tell you it was ice cold and delicious.

Katrina films

We're probably going to watch the Spike Lee movie just to say we saw it. It airs in two parts on HBO tomorrow and Tuesday.

Hurricane on the Bayou premiers at the IMAX theatre on August 29. It seems really interesting. Read more here. The last showing is 6pm so we'll have to miss it. We're going to check it out over the weekend.